I know, I know. You're waiting on the edge of your seat for escort card photos. Next week for sure (and boy, are they going to be great! Started last night with the velvet ribbon, which is proving to be more challenging than anticipated, but I will prevail! Photos soon!).

Anyways, today was not a paper-creating day. It was one of those mornings where, all of a sudden, three hours had gone by and I was quite literally covered in dirt. Oh, that doesn't happen to you, too?

It all started with this -->

You may recall in a blog post a month ago, the amazing (if I do say so myself) umbrella stand that my husband and I created and the potted plants I nestled in the cinder blocks. Well, about a week ago, one of the plants decided to kick the bucket and has been brown and crispy ever since, and the other plant is well on its way to plant heaven as well (don't be fooled by those flowers, the inside was completely crisp). Now, this is not the happy image I like to look at during my breakfast and/or cocktail hour on the roof. Easy fix: a quick little walk to our local nursery 3 blocks away, coleus was on sale so I bought 2, and boom, my umbrella stand is Pinterest-worthy yet again!

Now, replanting two pots and calling it a day is really not my thing. My thing is more to tackle tasks that seem easy and innocent but end up taking much more time and energy than anticipated (what's that phrase? "Hindsight is 20/20"). So on that 3 block walk to and from the nursery, I brainstormed what other plant woes have been nagging me that I could fix today (hey, if I'm going to open a bag of dirt, I might as well do more than two things with it, right?). I came up with quite a list of the houseplants that I've recently come to hate because 1) they annoy me, 2) they are ugly, and 3) I just don't like them:

Above left is the super cool hanging planter that my husband and I made last year (yes, it hangs from the ceiling! We followed these directions from Design Sponge...my only advice is to not tackle this project outdoors when it's below 40 degrees), but these pathetic little plants have only gotten more pathetic since we planted them. And then in that last photo, there is my little succulent that drops nubbins (what are those things called?!) if you look at it the wrong way, plus it's hanging on for dear life to two little chopsticks I stuck in the dirt. It was decided: today was a day for "Houseplant Hospital."

Now before I show you the amazing 'after' photos, I have to explain the spider plant saga (nope, nothing to do with Yoda). When we moved into our place last April, we had some friends over for dinner who brought us a teensy tiny spider plant in a cup of water. I had never heard of such a thing (sad, I know) but my friend told me that once the plant got bigger I could put it in dirt and it would grow and eventually spout off spider babies. Say what now?!?? I couldn't wait!

Well, as cool as they are, spider babies have come to be the bane of my existence, actually, because I keep taking pity on them and re-growing new spiders and now I have an entirely too large family of plants. Seriously. From left to right below, there's grandpa (the original), son, and 2 of 3 grandbabies. I'm a sucker for these things.

Anyways, if you haven't caught on to my train of thought this morning (and why would you? I can hardly keep up, too), the pathetic plants in the hanging planter got the boot and the spider grandbabies replaced them!

Nerd alert: is that not THE coolest thing ever???! You literally pluck a baby off of grandpa, stick it in water (or two tin cans and a mason jar if you're me), and a few weeks later it has ROOTS. Gardening is just mind-blowing sometimes.

Ahhhh. Much better. Now I won't have to curse at the old pathetic plants that looked so pitiful in the hanging planter. Surely these spider babies will grow too big in a couple months and cause me new annoyance, but then I just get to take them to the Hospital again to re-pot them!

Now, what happened to the pitiful old plants, you ask? My plan was to toss them out with the dirt because they looked gross and I've hated them for months. Easy solution, right? Well, turns out I'm a sucker for all plants, not just spider babies. I pulled the pathetic things out of their old pots and all of a sudden they looked like they had brand new potential! So, I took pity on the poor things and stuck them in either dirt or water. Cute, right?! It's now a fact: I need more windowsills.

After all of the fun and games, I was left with two empty mason jars and a tin can. Introducing: the great-grandbabies! Welcome home!